Modano, Rafalski among 34 invited to U.S. Olympic hockey camp

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Modano, Rafalski among 34 invited to U.S. Olympic hockey camp

What team boss Brian Burke calls the "warriors" who have played nearly every big international hockey event for the United States in the last 15 years looks to have been disbanded, except for one - Mike Modano.

The 39-year-old Modano was among 34 players invited by USA Hockey on Tuesday to its Olympic team orientation camp Aug. 17-19 in Woodridge, Ill., near Chicago.

It is a first step toward making the American team that will play at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver.

Modano has played at the last three Winter Games, but at that time the Dallas Stars centre was an offensive star on his way to becoming the highest-scoring American born player in NHL history. Now, he has a shot at going to the Olympics in more of a checking role.

"If you look at the evolution of the Dallas hockey club, Mike Modano's been asked to accept an increasingly defensive role," said Burke, the Toronto Maple Leafs general manager who is also GM of Team USA. "His production has fallen off, but his usefulness as a player has not.

"His role has changed and he's accepted that cheerfully. He's still an effective hockey player even though he's not putting up the numbers that he once did."

The Canadian Olympic team has a similar camp scheduled for Aug. 24-28 in Calgary.

The invitees were identified by a seven-member committee, including Burke, who rated players through the NHL season.

Those not even invited to the U.S. camp include long-time national team stalwarts who are still active like Keith Tkachuk, Jeremy Roenick and Bill Guerin. They and now-retired stars like Brian Leetch, Brett Hull and Mike Richter formed the core of Olympic and World Cup teams back well into the 1990s.

"I tried to reach a lot of the older players who have not been invited, including some household names," added Burke. "We've got a group of warriors who have represented our country extremely well for 15 years."

Modano will have plenty of youth around him at the U.S. camp.

The notable forwards on the list of invitees include youngsters Zach Parise, Patrick Kane, Paul Stastny, Bobby Ryan, Phil Kessel and Dustin Brown, as well as some veterans like Chris Drury, Scott Gomez and Jamie Langenbrunner.

The defence is led by veteran Brian Rafalski, and also includes both Erik and Jack Johnson, Tom Gilbert, Mike Komisarek and both Brooks Orpik and Rob Scuderi of the Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins.

Only three goalies were invited - Vezina Trophy winner Tim Thomas of the Boston Bruins, Ryan Miller of the Buffalo Sabres and 23-year-old Jonathan Quick of the Los Angeles Kings.

Burke said as many as 50 others will be asked to participate in a pre-Olympic anti-doping program, which makes them eligible to be added to the team.

The final roster will be announced near the end of the year and "we'll wait till the latest day possible to name our 23-man team.

"If we did our job, the entire team will come out of this camp, but my suspicion is that, knowing how competitive our athletes are, that's not going to be the case. Some of these guys not invited are going to try to jam that right down my throat and I welcome that."

Not invited was New York islanders goaltender Rick DiPietro, although Burke said he is not likely to be recovered from his injuries in time for the Games.

The camp is not a try-out for the team, he insisted. There will be no scrimmages or tests, but the coaching staff led by the Leafs' Ron Wilson will lay out the system they will play and the management will work on team building.

The management team consulted some of what Burke called "core" players who are locks to make the team in advance when planning the camp.

Among them was Kane, the gifted forward for the Chicago Blackhawks who was drafted first overall in 2007 - 19 years after Modano was the No. 1 pick.

"It's exciting times, hearing an announcement like this and knowing you're part of the group that may be playing in the Olympics, especially growing up in the U.S. and watching different U.S. teams playing in tournaments," Kane said on a conference call.

The list of three goalies, 12 defencemen and 19 forwards has only five players with Olympic experience, including three from the team that won silver in Lake Placid in 2002 - Modano, Drury and Rafalski. Modano also played at the 1998 and 2006 Games. Gomez was a member of the 2006 team while Langenbrunner played in 1998.

Burke said that with the Olympic tournament being played on an NHL-size ice surface, skill level is not the only criteria for selection to the team, which will also need some bigger players and checkers.

"We tried to identify people who can perform certain tasks," he added. "I think we've got a good blend. We've got some first violins and we've got some tuba players too, so we're happy with the group."

On paper, it is not a group that is likely to challenge Canada, Russia or Sweden for gold, but Burke warned against counting his team out.

"We're going to be an underdog in Vancouver, we know that," he said. "There's not going to be a penny bet on us in Las Vegas, we know that.

"We will probably be the youngest team in the tournament, we know that. But we are going there to win and we tried to identify a group that will give us our best chance to do that."

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Philip Larsen got knocked unconscious, the Canucks retailiated without knowing what happened, and they could have hurt their teammate even worse in the process.

The incident was horrific. We can all agree on that.

Tuesday night in New Jersey, Vancouver Canucks blueliner Philip Larsen skated behind his net to retrieve a puck. He had no idea Devils left winger Taylor Hall was pursuing the same puck. They collided heavily. Larsen bashed his head on the ice and was knocked out cold.

It was a scary scene, undoubtedly, one that understandably evoked a ton of emotion from Larsen's teammates. It was hardly a surprise to see a flurry of Vancouver players swarm Hall and make him fight.

It was a shame, however, for multiple reasons. First off, the hit wasn't dirty. It wasn't even a deliberate bodycheck. Hall leaned back on his skates to slow his momentum and held out his arms as if protecting himself from imminent impact. It was more of a crash than a bonecrushing hit. We can debate whether Larsen's head was the principal point of contact – I don't believe it was at all – but it's irrelevant when assessing Hall's guilt. There was no intent there. He won't be disciplined by the NHL for an accident.

And yet, thanks to the sport's culture of immediate and forceful vengeance, Hall had to fight anyway. In the spur of the moment, in the heat of elite competition, players are simply too jacked up to take a breath and assess the situation. They see a comrade fall and, in mere milliseconds, seek and destroy whoever caused the harm.

“You always have a problem with a hit when one of your guys gets hit hard," Canucks coach Willie Desjardins told the Vancouver Province's Jason Botchford after the the game. "It doesn’t matter if it’s a clean hit. You have a problem when a guy gets hit that hard. I think all coaches would.”

The ironic thing about this tough-guy mentality is that it could end up pushing one of the toughest things about hockey out of the game: good, clean hits. If the swarm mentality goes on much longer, the only guys willing to lay opponents out with big hits will be those ready and willing to drop the gloves right afterward. Sooner or later players might decide it's not worth sitting five minutes and/or risking injury just to put a lick on a guy. And, in Hall's case, he wasn't even trying to drill Larsen.

Will we ever stop seeing players attacked after clean hits? I doubt it. The revenge assault is a crime of passion, a snap decision. But maybe, just maybe, the Canucks and players all over the world can learn a bit from what happened right after Larsen got hit. Watch:

The first instinct, sadly, is not to help Larsen, but to destroy Hall. Center Michael Chaput immediately starts a fight. That causes a pileup of players from both teams – all around the unconscious Larsen. It's downright disturbing to see him getting kicked in the head by his own teammates’ skates. Canucks goalie Jacob Markstrom tries to box out Larsen and keep him safe. Markus Granlund tries as well but has to step over and onto Larsen in the process. It’s a miracle Larsen wasn’t cut. None of that would've happened had Chaput thought of Larsen first.

The ugly scene is a reminder that, right after a teammate takes a massive hit, the first priority should be to protect him. The best way to do that isn't to attack his attacker. It's to attend to the teammate first. There's plenty of time to review what happened and take down the perpetrator's number for later in the game. That's what jumbo-tron replays are for. And, in cases like Hall's, the violence would be averted altogether if players watched the replay and realized it was an accident.

Sadly, the idea is a pipe dream, and I don’t expect players to learn from Larsen's fate anytime soon. But we can always hope.

Bettman says next season's salary cap could go ‘a couple or so million up'

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Bettman says next season's salary cap could go ‘a couple or so million up'

The NHL could be looking at a $2 million rise in the salary cap for next season, but early projections should be taken with a grain of salt. In December 2015, a potential rise of $3 million was projected. The upper limit increased by only $1.6 million.

It’s still far too soon to tell, but early estimations have it looking like the salary cap could jump up as much as $2 million ahead of the 2017-18 campaign.

Following the NHL’s Board of Governors meetings on Thursday, commissioner Gary Bettman was asked about what the league sees as a potential cap for the upcoming campaign, which, among other things, will see the introduction of the league’s 31st franchise in the Vegas Golden Knights.

Bettman didn’t give an exact figure as to what the cap will look like, but he said there’s the potential for the upper limit to move by roughly $2 million.

"There's always a range, but it's something we're going to have to look at very carefully in terms of how may be best to approach it," Bettman said, according to NHL.com’s Dan Rosen. "The cap could range from where it is now to a couple or so million up, but we're going to all have to focus on what makes most sense going forward.”

Any increase in the cap would be good news for the players, especially pending unrestricted free agents looking to land long-term, big-money deals. St. Louis Blues defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk and Tampa Bay Lightning netminder Ben Bishop are two of the biggest names currently slated to hit the open market come July 2017.

Of course, there’s a chance the cap stays flat, which Bettman also indicated, but said he’d prefer to speak with the NHLPA about a possible flat cap before answering questions about it.

Before any GMs with tight cap situations or fans who’re praying their respective teams get some cap breathing room go celebrating, it’s worth noting that early projections for the 2016-17 salary cap saw the upper limit increasing by close to $3 million. That would have seen the cap rise from $71.4 million to $74.5 million, and anyone paying close attention to the financials of the league’s teams is aware that rise in the upper limit didn’t quite come to fruition.

Instead, the cap for the current campaign is $71.4 million, and the rise is mostly thanks to the NHLPA using their five-percent “escalator clause.” Had the players not used the clause, there was some concern the cap could have actually dipped from the past season to the current campaign. Some projections had the cap possibly falling below $70 million for 2016-17.

A rise of $2 million would be only slightly more than the $1.6 million increase from 2015-16 to 2016-17, and it would be one of the smallest increases since the salary cap was introduced in 2005-06. From 2008-09 to 2009-10, the cap rose by only $100,000 and there was no rise in the cap from 2011-12 to 2013-14, with teams allowed to spend to a $60-million limit during the 2012-13 lockout-shortened campaign.

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The Golden Knights have hit another hurdle with their name, this time with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. A trademark request has been rejected, but it doesn’t sound like the team expects a name change.

The Vegas Golden Knights are really having a tough time catching a break in the naming department.

On Wednesday, a trademark request by the Golden Knights was rejected by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in large part because the name and logo were deemed too similar to that of the NCAA’s College of St. Rose Golden Knights.

Yes, that’s right, yet another roadblock between the NHL’s newest franchise and the name Golden Knights.

The first hurdle for the team, and the first real hubbub about the name, came shortly after the naming ceremony in late November. The team had only had the Golden Knights moniker in place for a week when it was reported by The Fayetteville Observer’s Steve DeVane that the U.S. Army was set to review Vegas’ use of the name because it is shared by the Army’s highly decorated parachute team.

And all that came after Vegas owner Bill Foley purposely strayed from his first choice for the team name, Black Knights, in order to avoid any conflict with the U.S. Army’s NCAA athletics programs and after the singular name, Knights, was reportedly avoided in order to forego any conflict with the OHL’s London Knights.

Suffice to say, the naming process has been a headache thus far. However, before those who despise the name and/or logo go celebrating in the streets, it should be noted that the latest naming hurdle likely means nothing in the long run.

“Office actions like this are not at all unusual, and we will proceed with the help of outside counsel in preparing a response to this one,” the statement reads.

In their statement, Vegas also pointed to the shared names of UCLA and Boston, both named the Bruins, Miami and Carolina, both named the Hurricanes, and even pointed out that Vegas and Clarkson share the Golden Knights name. None of this is to mention the MLB’s Texas Rangers and the NHL’s New York Rangers share a name.

“We believe, at the end of the day, all parties will embrace the fact that we are the Vegas Golden Knights and this absolutely will work out,” Craven told Gotz. “I hope people don’t overreact to this at all. We believe everyone will be satisfied. We are only going to enhance the name Golden Knights for everyone. That’s our goal.”

UPDATE: NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly has released the following statement:

“We are currently reviewing the Trademark Office's letter and will prepare a detailed response demonstrating why we continue strongly to believe the Vegas Golden Knights mark should be registered in co-existence with the college registration, just as a number of other nicknames currently co-exist in professional and college sports (particularly where there is no overlap as to the sport for which the nickname is being used). That response is not due until June 7, 2017.

“We consider this a routine matter and it is not our intention to reconsider the name or logo of this franchise. We fully intend to proceed as originally planned, relying on our common law trademark rights as well as our state trademark registrations while we work through the process of addressing the question raised in the federal applications.”

Holland had been left in Toronto as the Maple Leafs opened a three-game western road trip in late November and has not suited up for the Leafs since Nov. 26. The 6-foot-2, 195-pound forward was a healthy scratch in 17 of the Leafs first 25 games this season.

In eight games, Holland has one assist and a minus-2 rating while averaging 10:43 in ice time a night. Holland is on a one-year, $1.3 million contract this season, and according to CapFriendly, is owed $881,111 for the remainder of the season.

"Peter is a big, solid centerman with good NHL experience," Coyotes general manager John Chayka said in a statement. "We look forward to having him join our team."

Acquired from the Anaheim Ducks in November 2013, the Caledon, Ontario native appeared in 174 games with the Leafs, over parts of four seasons, scoring 25 goals and 63 points.

The 25-year-old also played a role in the American Hockey League’s Toronto Marlies reaching a seventh game of the conference finals during the 2014 Calder Cup playoffs.

For the Leafs, the move gives general manager Lou Lamoriello another contract spot to work with. Prior to the deal, Toronto had 48 contracts – two shy of the maximum of 50.

Friday’s move gives the Leafs the flexibility to sign goaltender Karri Ramo to a contract for the remainder of the season. The 30-year-old signed a professional tryout with the Marlies on Tuesday and made 33 saves in 3-2 loss to the Utica Comets on Wednesday night.

Since waiving goaltender Jhonas Enroth on Tuesday, and assigning him to the Marlies, the Leafs are looking for a suitable veteran presence behind Frederik Andersen and Ramo could fill the void.

The trade with the Coyotes also gives Lamoriello roster flexibility to activate forward Josh Leivo off non-roster injury reserve. Leivo has yet to play this season due to a lower body injury. The 23-year-old played five games with the Marlies earlier in the season as part of a conditioning assignment, but was deemed not ready to return to NHL action with the Leafs.